24h in Hell's Kitchen
by Ark Q
Summary: A short sequence of moments and thoughts during a very special day that reunifies once more our four Hell's Kitchen friends for another not-that-happy occasion. Little bit of slash Michael/Lorenzo. [Sleepers]
1. Chapter 1

**24h in Hell's Kitchen**

**Time: 1:00 a.m.**

At one o'clock in the morning a received a brief call that nothing and nobody would have ever prepared me to receive. I held the phone in one fist and the coffee mug in the other. The computer screen and I were face to face. It was silent for too long. When I hung up, a blank Microsoft Word page mirrored what was left of my midnight writer exhaustion.

John Reilly was dead.

**A/N Key note: I haven't read the book, just seen the movie. For those who did, I'm sorry if the reconstruction of some events are completely off. That said, I'm gonna try to keep the narrator style (I said try) while giving some small fragments of normality. Don't expect too much, really.**


	2. Chapter 2

**When the domino gets started**

_I remember the first time I asked myself if we were all going to die together. I remember the spits of rain against the bedroom window in that long winter night that found me up till dawn. I was twenty-two at that time. Barely entered in my brand new apartment, hardly eager to fight my way into society. Quiet and imperfect in my detachment from the entire world. Insensitive to the race of time. _

_The sudden knocking caught me scribbling on a block-notes. It must have been three, maybe three fifteen in the morning. The smell of cold and the rain chirping outside where spoiled only by the television's voices and colours. I would have never guessed that what followed was a moment to be remembered. A moment to stored in my memories, among many others, as a key one. _

_Nobody ever tells you when the domino gets started. _

_I followed the excitement of a familiar voice as I headed towards the door. Bare step after bare step, stomping silently on the living room floor. The certainty of what I was going to find on the other side deceived me. To this day, I still can't say why I didn't try to stop him. To this day, I know that that was probably my only chance to do it. Quiet and detached from his need to tell him that he was going where he couldn't come back, I just sat on a chair and listened to Tommy's enthusiasm as he spent the whole night describing the details of his very first murder._

_I remember the first time I asked myself if we were all going to die together. I was twenty-two at that time. I remember the blind hope inside my best friend's eyes and those fingers that couldn't give up the trembling. The race of time has a funny way to make you responsible. It creeps into the fine line between powerlessness and desire to be powerless. The border that saves victims from abusers._

_I still can't say if I just thought he didn't deserve to be stopped._


	3. Chapter 3

**Time: 2:15 a.m.**

It took me more than one hour to figure out nobody was going to pick up. The cold reiteration of mute notes limped along with my steps measuring the length of the hallway rug. When the doorbell rang, I was still bickering with the answering machine.

It was March and it was a cold one too. Hell's Kitchen streets stood black and rusty under an autumn-looking moon and not many happy stars. As I opened the door, I already knew. There was a taxi parked beside the sidewalk line, right in front of my apartment. It left one minute later with a cry of tyres and a Mexican salute. In that minute we didn't even say 'hi'. We never needed to.

"I told you I'd found you when you needed me." he opened with.

"I hope you were in the neighbourhood for some good sightseeing, or you gotta really reconsider your bad luck."

"I always do."

"You always have to."

"How about you let me in and remind me of why I moved three thousand miles from here."

"I don't know, counsellor." I replied, still holding the phone to my ear. "I think you may need a warrant this time."

"Will you settle for a London Subway souvenir?"

After almost four years of sporadic phone calls and bland holydays wishes, Michael was standing on my entrance stairs looking as neat, young and indomitable as always. Same old cigarette between the teeth, same old impatient eyes. The smile we gave each other was born to fill the silence of the uneasy topic that was about to come up. But we still tried to postpone the inevitable.

"How long are you staying this time, Mikey." I asked him, with arms crossed across the chest and the phone finally abandoned to the grip of one hand.

He shrugged. And played with the handrail. He was looking elsewhere: "I wanted to be here for the funeral."

"You wanted to organize it or to attend it?"

"Is that sarcasm?" he chuckled. He wasn't looking elsewhere anymore. "I have my flight back tonight at one o'clock."

The siren of a police car rushed the silent into noise. Hell's Kitchen never slept. I motioned to him to enter: "Well, welcome home, counsellor." I said. "You really couldn't have chosen better twenty-four hours to dive into old memories."


	4. Chapter 4

'**Home'**

_Coming back home from Wilkinson was as dreadful as it was staying there. The confusion of a cemented sky felt more imprisoning than freedom itself. Truth is cruel. And simple. _

_We never came back._

_The same sidewalks lost their juvenile appeal, the same corridors of tiles and dusty alleys felt funny to those who closed their eyes every night in a box of fright, shame and silent anger. The word 'home' had died. It was normality and it was supposed to be enough. We obeyed that normality. We obeyed the tyranny of expectations we couldn't meet anymore. Our lives washed out, we had to fake the colours. Our chests sore and empty, we laughed hard –no: harder- until everyone believed nothing had changed. _

_But the word 'home' had died. _

_My dad was insensitive to the look on my face. My mom chose to pretend she didn't see. The only ones who saw were way too busy blinding themselves- as fast as they could, as deep as they needed to- and I really don't know if I could have stand otherwise. _

_Our friendship wasn't over. We still enjoyed the melancholic relief of our mutual presence, packed with the ghosts of uncomfortable truths that didn't seem to know how to rest. Every single time we met each other's eyes. They were there. _

_Sometimes I wonder if we just gave in to those ghosts. If we just chose to preserve some sense of men pride instead of trusting our team. It may have gone other way, who knows. If we just collected the words before it was too late to scream. And, though I know that some battles are made to be fought in the darkness of a single mind and some cannot really bear the company of similar armies, I can't help but think. _

_Think that we let our home die. _

_And we never stopped, not even one day, mourning over it._


End file.
